IBM

The company size is both a gift and a curse.

IBM is a great place if you are hired into the right division. There is a lot of work to be done, and there is almost certainly a position that will be a fit for you. However, there is some time between switching internally. At least 6 months to a year is typical to be allowed switching between positions.

The pay is competitive to the region you are working in. In the Bay Area, salaries were bumped up compared to other areas due to high cost of living and to ensure competitive wages.

Benefits are also competitive to other companies in your region.

Integrity is also paramount, and there will be emails from the corporate office that reflect that ideal as much.

Most of the managers I met were very friendly and were willing to work with you on any issues or needs. In particular, working from home was very easy to request and was set up in about a day or two.

Some of the most useful benefits I used were:

• The discounted public transportation
• The use of the mail room for sending/receiving packages

There was a game room with a foosball table and an exercise room that were rarely ever used (not sure if these are pros but sort of?).

The size of the company is particularly helpful if your division has not been doing well on the quarterly reports, since you can switch to another position. Additionally, it provides stability to your position, since your division can go unnoticed for some time. This buys you some time to request a transfer if your division isn't performing well.

The company is itself huge. As such, the response to market forces is very slow. Although this does allow you to predict whether or not your division is going to get the axe.

If you find that your division is not meeting expectations, you can switch positions hopefully within the next quarter, two quarters tops (if you think there are some real improvements coming to the market of your focus) before that particular segment of the business is dissolved or merged into another part of the IBM business, or axed (fairly rare though).

The room for advancement is limited. The company is huge, and as such, makes it difficult to get recognition.

Lastly, not really sure if this is a con, but there weren't as many facilities (dry cleaner, massage, etc.) when compared to other companies like Google or Facebook. That might be important to some potential employees; it wasn't for me though.

The company size and management structure is too big and slow to react in a meaningful way to customer demands. There needs to be more autonomy given to the managers at the ground level so that they can respond more quickly to customer needs, and not take a quarter to two to make necessary adjustments to ensure the highest customer satisfaction.